Apr 13, 2008 at 11:10 PM by David Pleasant
Addressing steelworkers in Steelton, Pennsylvania, Obama levied the strongest attack on The Duck Hunter that I’ve heard him deliver the entire campaign. He referred to her as Annie Oakley (from the musical Anne Get Your Gun) and said she is out there talking "like she’s on the duck blind every Sunday."
Not losing sight of John McCain in this bitter feud, Obama said he expected to be attacked by McCain, but was "disappointed" in The Duck Hunter.
Turning the tables on Clinton, Obama said Clinton’s record proved she was not concerned with working-class voters. Referring to money she has received from drug and insurance company PACs and lobbyists, Obama said, "I just have to remind people of the track record."
"This is the same person who took money from financial folks on Wall Street and then voted for bankruptcy bill that makes it harder for folks right here in Pennsylvania to get a fair shake. Who do you think is out of touch?"
"This is the same person who spent a decade with her husband campaigning for NAFTA, and now goes around saying she’s opposed to NAFTA."
Making a dig at Clinton’s hypocritical criticism of Obama in Ohio over NAFTA, he said: "She knows better. Shame on her. Shame on her."
Watch the video.
Apr 13, 2008 at 9:38 PM by David Pleasant
Some duck hunters aren’t too happy with The Duck Hunter according to First Read:
In this afternoon’s conference call sponsored by the Pennsylvania Sportsmen and Sportswomen for Obama, small-town politicians said the latest attacks from the Clinton campaign are shameless, aimed at creating divisions in their communities.
“Trying to turn small-town Pennsylvanians against each other for political gain is shameless," said Mayor John Fetterman of Braddock, Pa. Fetterman blasted the New York senator for trying to win votes by patronizing gun owners, a move he said shows a willingness to win at all costs.
“I think it’s really discouraging and tacky to see Hillary Clinton pandering as if she’s a gun owner,” said Fetterman. “I think it demonstrates and represents willingness to say anything and everything to get elected.”
Apr 13, 2008 at 8:53 PM by David Pleasant
The elitist-scorning presidential candidate presented her bona fides to voters in Valparaiso, Indiana yesterday by telling them how experienced she was with guns. CNN’s account of Clinton’s stump speech:
Hillary Clinton appealed to Second Amendment supporters on Saturday by hinting that she has some experience of her own pulling triggers.
“I disagree with Sen. Obama’s assertion that people in our country cling to guns and have certain attitudes about trade and immigration simply out of frustration,” she began, referring to the Obama comments on small-town Americans that set off a political tumult on Friday.
She then introduced a fond memory from her youth.
“You know, my dad took me out behind the cottage that my grandfather built on a little lake called Lake Winola outside of Scranton and taught me how to shoot when I was a little girl,” she said. . . .
Noting that many hunters and gun collectors want to keep weapons out of the hands of criminals, Clinton referred to her positive childhood experiences with firearms.
“As I told you, my dad taught me how to shoot behind our cottage,” she said. “I have gone hunting. I am not a hunter. But I have gone hunting.”
Clinton said she has hunted ducks.
In the April 26 MSNBC Democratic presidential debate last year, NBC’s Brian Williams raised the issue of gun control and the Second Amendment. At about 11:10 in the video, you can see Williams asking: “How many of you in your adult lifetime have had a gun in your house?”. Three candidates raised their hands. The duck hunter did not.
Apr 13, 2008 at 4:16 PM by David Pleasant
Since Friday, Hillary Clinton has been hammering Barack Obama about his "elitist" values and on how his beliefs are "not reflective of the values and beliefs of Americans." But today responding to a question about the last time she fired a gun or went to church services, Clinton said it "is not a relevant question in this debate” over Barack Obama’s recent comments on small town Americans.
It is quite interesting that for two days Sen. Obama’s faith, values, and beliefs are fair game, but today hers are not. In fact it stands in stark contrast to Sen. Clinton’s remark in a stump speech yesterday that "It is a fundamental expression of who we are and what we believe."
Suggesting that her values, beliefs, and practices were representative of the citizenry, Sen. Clinton decried that Obama’s values were not the values of Americans she knew.
"Not the Americans I know. Not the Americans I grew up with. Not the Americans I lived with in Arkansas or represent in New York."
"Americans who believe in God, believe it’s a matter of personal faith."
Referencing her own personal faith she said, "You know, in my day, I grew up — it was in a working class family in Scranton. I grew up in a church-going family. A family that believed in the importance of living out and expressing our faith." She added, "People who embrace faith, not because they are materially poor, but because they are spiritually rich. Our faith is the faith of our parents and our grandparents."
Furthermore, it appears Sen. Clinton made another "misstatement" in her speech yesterday when she said she grew up in Scranton. She was born in Chicago and grew up there as well.
Apr 13, 2008 at 2:46 PM by David Pleasant
The Scranton, Pennsylvania Times-Tribune endorses Barack Obama. It is also worth noting, as the editorial board did, that Scranton is the hometown of Hillary Clinton’s father.
In a nomination campaign that has defied convention, Mr. Obama has energized an entire generation of voters that, for the most part, otherwise had checked out of political participation. That, at least, portends a new approach to governance that can help to dissipate the political miasma that has engulfed Washington at least since the impeachment of former President Bill Clinton.
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton is an extremely talented politician who already has secured a unique place in U.S. political history. She repeatedly has proved her political death notices to be premature. She also has demonstrated that she is a master of public policy. And — this is not and should not be taken lightly in an area that prides itself on family and a tradition of supporting its own — the Rodham family has deep Scranton roots.
But Mrs. Clinton also is a political lightning rod. There is little doubt that a second Clinton presidency would further the deep divisiveness that characterizes American politics — a divisiveness that dug itself deep during the Clinton presidency, and even deeper during the Bush-Cheney years….
Mrs. Clinton has dismissed much of what Mr. Obama has had to say as “just words.” But they are words that millions find inspirational. Therefore, they are words that can be translated into action….
Apr 13, 2008 at 1:48 PM by David Pleasant
Last night I reiterated my position that Hillary Clinton’s campaign is based on Lee Atwater’s "demonizing your opponent" strategy. In a piece today Carl Bernstein raises the Atwater strategy, and asserts Clinton is confusing voters, congressional members (GOP and Dems), and the rest of the world, all of which are precisely the very points I raised. Moreover, Bernstein retracts the more favorable view he portrayed in his recent biography of Clinton, A Woman in Charge.
Bernstein frames his argument around the question, "What will a Hillary Clinton presidency look like?"
The answer by now seems obvious: It will look like her presidential campaign, which in turn looks increasingly like the first Clinton presidency.
Which is to say, high-minded ideals, lowered execution, half truths, outright lies (and imaginary flights), take-no prisoners politics, some very good policy ideas, a presidential spouse given to wallowing in anger and self-pity, and a succession of aides and surrogates pushed under the bus when things don’t go right. Which is to say, often.
And [sic] endless psychodrama: the essential Clintonian experience that mesmerizes the press, confuses the citizenry, confounds members of both parties in Congress (not to mention the Clintons themselves, at times) and pretty much keeps the rest of the world constantly amused and fixated….
In fact, the demotion of Penn –- like the departure of Hillary’s acolyte Patty Solis Doyle as campaign manager –- is a confession that, for all her claims of “experience” and leadership abilities, Hillary Clinton has now presided over two disastrous national enterprises, the most important professional undertakings of her adult life, both of which she began with ample wind at her back: the healthcare reform of her husband’s presidency, and now her own campaign for the White House. These two failures -– and the demonizing of her opponents in both instances –- may be the best indication of the kind of President she would be, especially when confronted (inevitably) by unanticipated difficulty and/or entrenched opposition to her ideas and programs.
It is exactly under such circumstances that she usually resorts to the worst excesses that mark her in full warrior-mode — and all its scorched-earth, truth-be-damned manifestations. Bosnia, anyone? Smearing the women involved (or even thought to be involved) sexually with her husband. Responding to Barack Obama with the same mindset, disdain, and arsenal as she did Karl Rove and Lee Atwater, as if Obama’s politics and methodologies were as mendacious and vicious as theirs–and her own. Tax information kept secret (in 1992 to hide her profits from trading in cattle futures; in 2008 to shield the identities of Bill’s foreign clients.) A campaign that openly boasts of throwing “the kitchen sink” at her opponent…..
The assumption of many senatorial colleagues, former Clinton aides, and reporters (including this one) was that her presidential campaign would be much different from the one she and Bill Clinton waged through the White House years.
In A Woman in Charge, I wrote about her ability to evolve, observable especially in the years before she met Bill Clinton and in the Senate: to learn from her mistakes. Events have proven me wrong on that count.
The 2008 Clinton campaign, in fact, has been an exercise in devolution, back to the angry, demonizing, accusatory Hillary Clinton of the worst days of the Clinton presidency, flailing, and furtive, and disingenuous; and, as in the White House years, putting forth programs and ideas worthy of respect and deserving of the kind of substantive debate she claims she wants her race against Barrack Obama to be based upon….
In the process of their search-and-destroy mission against Barack Obama, the Clintons have pursued a strategy that at times seems deliberately aimed at undermining Obama’s credibility if he becomes John McCain’s opponent — heresy in the view of an increasing number of the Clintons’ former suppporters [sic] and aides, a suprising [sic] number of whom now back Obama.
(Emphasis added.)
Apr 13, 2008 at 1:27 AM by David Pleasant
Pathetic.
From TPM:
The distribution of "we’re not bitter" stickers to her campaign rallies is the height of over-the-top crudity, and the reports are that very few audience members seem to have much enthusiasm for this nonsense. Not surprisingly, people cannot see the reasons for so much fuss.
Apr 13, 2008 at 1:06 AM by David Pleasant
I have intentionally not commented on the meltdown Hillary is trying to force because I wanted to see what would transpire today. It is as I expected. Several weeks ago I discussed the logic behind Hillary’s ranting and raving. Her long-standing strategy has been to destroy Obama using Lee Atwater’s "demonizing the opponent" strategy.
David Sirota aptly characterizes the "bitter" kerfuffle.
I really don’t get this. Obama is supposedly an "elitist" and "out of touch" for stating a truism: that when people get treated like crap by corporations and politicians, they get bitter. But I’d say the elitists and the out of touch are Washington insiders who are so comfortably insulated from accountability that they have convinced themselves that when they crap all over Americans, Americans respond with an elated "thank you, may I have another?"
Has the political discussion in this country become so cartoonishly absurd that it is "controversial" to say that when people get taken advantage of, people get upset?
And since Hillary is compelled to express so much outrage, it is worth noting a comment Bill Clinton made just two days ago.
“I get tickled that so many things in these presidential elections, people make mountains out of molehills, and sometimes even worse — make molehills out of mountains."
As always, minimize any criticism levied on the Clintons, but lie, distort, and exaggerate when it comes to their opponents.
These are excerpts from a lengthy post I wrote several weeks ago on Clinton’s demonizing strategy:
Hillary Clinton is a master at slinging mud…If Hillary doesn’t formally initiate it, she is equally masterful at franchised mudslinging. She has digressed from the politics of personal destruction that Bill Clinton made famous to Lee Atwater’s notorious and despicable strategy of demonizing the opponent. …
Hillary’s campaign has all the bells and whistles of Atwater’s and the constant micro-explosions…that discombobulates and causes dissembling. When combined, the Clinton campaign has a very calculated strategy to achieve a complex objective – divide and conquer. …
Hillary’s purveyors of racism, scandal, fear, and personal destruction, are not merely playing hardball politics. They are literally fighting a war. A psychological war. It’s hearts and minds, but they’re not overly concerned about winning hearts and minds. They just want to instill doubt in many and crush a few. Winning them ultimately will take care of itself if their conquer and divide strategy is successful.
Team Clinton is effectively generating a national conflict and disturbance that has negative global media exposure and changes rapidly, which insures continuous high-profile coverage in news cycles. …
Each racist remark, each negative innuendo, each association with fear, is not any different than dropping relatively small bombs from 40,000 feet. They cause relative damage, generate a loud boom, but do not create, by and within themselves, mass destruction. However, if repeated frequently over time, they create, for all practical purposes, mass destruction. …
The objective is to inflict damage on every Obama “front” possible, so that it will: (1) stop or seriously impede the masses from flowing to Obama; (2) cause just enough existing supporters to abandon ship - it doesn’t have to be a high volume — just enough to disillusion others whether coming or staying; and (3) wound enough current Obama supporters that won’t exit regardless of the circumstances, but become disaffected — “boil all the hope out them.”
[Clinton intends to] inflict enough systemic psychological damage on his campaign, and [thereby] over time be able to convince pledged and superdelegates, directly or indirectly, that Obama will not survive a general election. …
Sending Atwater-trained Geraldine Ferraro out to exploit race and generate widespread division among Obama’s supporters (existing and potential) across the country was classic and executed perfectly. As I said earlier, inflict systemic damage, which is exactly how others have characterized it as well.
Georgetown law professor Emma Coleman Jordan, an Obama supporter who sat on the fence for a long time because she so admired Hillary Clinton, sees the Ferraro episode as “part of a systematic project” to raise Obama’s negatives. “It is so sad that we’ve come to this,” she said, “that a Democratic Party liberal [Clinton] has chosen to pick up the dirtiest tool in the political box to win. I’m sad. You can put that in a quote. But it’s no longer possible to avoid the conclusion that this string of events is not an accident.”
This is where the nexus of constantly dropping small bombs – create the systemic damage – and not having to win hearts and minds today, becomes so important. Damage the tens of millions of voters and it doesn’t matter. All that must be done is ensure delegates, and superdelegates perceive disaffected constituents. More importantly are how supedelegates are led to perceive the environment, because they instinctively have loyalty to party first and country second. The most important thing superdelegates are going to consider is, who can put the Party in the White House? And they’ll nominate Mike Gravel if they think he is the only person who can and will win the White House.
For weeks, Hillary’s campaign hasn’t given winning the nomination legitimately a moment’s thought. The question is how can she get it, not how can she win it. Break the party apart, tear it down, literally destroy Barack Obama in the process, and have superdelegates do what they have always done best – take care of the well-established Washington political machine.
